Wisconsin Lost In Bizarre Fashion After An Arizona State Player Laid On The Ball As The Clock Ran Down

Wisconsin looked all set to kick a game-winning field goal against Arizona State last night when a strange sequence of events resulted in the most bizarre ending of the season.

Arizona State won 32-30 after Wisconsin botched a kneel down, a defender sat on the ball, and the clock ran out with the Badgers at the 15-yard line.

Here’s the video, we’ll talk about what the heck happened below:

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It’s all very confusing, but here’s what happened:

Wisconsin QB Joel Stave wanted to put the ball in the middle of the field for his kicker, so his plan was to snap the ball with 18 seconds left, run toward the center of the field, and take a knee.

He ended up slamming into his own player as he was going down to take a knee, making it look like he never touched the ground. On the regular angle, it looks like his knee never touched, but the reverse angle shows that it did:

The crowd yelled “FUMBLE” after Stave placed the ball on the ground, which it would have been if his knee never touched. So an Arizona State defender flopped on the ball with 12 seconds left, and didn’t get up as precious time ticked off the clock.

At the very least, the refs should have shown more urgency in getting the ball spotted so Wisconsin could spike it with time left to kick a field goal. It’s also a delay of game penalty for a defender to prevent the refs from spotting the game, so they should have flagged ASU, stopped the clock, and let Wisconsin have one more play.